Contact:
Carol Kerkvliet
Assistant Area Management Biologist
Phone: (907) 235-8191
June 27, 2012
The noncommercial (subsistence, personal use, and sport) Tanner crab fisheries will not open July 15 for the 2012 - 2013 season in Cook Inlet waters west of a line from Point Pogibshi to Anchor Point and along the North Gulf Coast.
The department recently completed the Kamishak Bay Tanner crab abundance survey and measured no legal-sized Tanner crab. The Tanner crab harvest strategy adopted by the Alaska Board of Fisheries in 2002 requires a minimum estimate of 40,000 legal male Tanner crab in Kamishak Bay in order for noncommercial fisheries to open west of the line from Point Pogibshi to Anchor Point and the North Gulf Coast.
In addition, the season will not open July 15 in Kachemak Bay and may remain closed for the 2012 - 2013 season pending trawl survey results. Survey results are expected to be finalized and followed by an announcement in mid-July. The department’s 2011 Kachemak Bay survey estimate of 41,595 legal male Tanner crab was below the closure threshold set by the Alaska Board of Fisheries in 2002. Notably, the decline observed in legal male abundance was also apparent across all but the smallest size
classes of male Tanner crab.
For additional information, contact biologists Charlie Trowbridge or Carol Kerkvliet in Homer .
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SPORT, SUBSISTENCE, PERSONAL USE TANNER CRAB FISHERIES TO REMAIN CLOSED IN KAMISHAK, KACHEMAK, NORTH GULF COAST WATERS